New Music: Ted Leo and the Pharmacists: "Old Souls Know" [Stream]
Part of anticipating a new Ted Leo album is looking forward to all the B-sides, covers, and insane live performances that accompany it. This track is the first taste of the non-album madness resulting from Leo's upcoming full-length, Living With the Living, culled from a limited-edition five-song bonus EP that will be packaged exclusively with the album's first pressing.
According to Touch and Go, Leo says, "None of us had actually played any of these songs before the day of tracking. I had written them over the previous week or two, and we learned and banged them out in one afternoon, and mixed the next day." That impulsiveness translates to immediacy on "Old Souls Know", which, as is signaled by the opening hi-hat, is as raw a Leo original as you're likely to hear. The track is all about those enormous drums and power chords, but Ted's guitar solo differs a bit from his usual virtuoso leanings: It's slightly drunker and looser, kind of like the song's lyrics, which come fast enough to be all but indecipherable.
[from the Living With the Living pre-order bonus EP] | [PRE-ORDER]